Since its inception in 2011, WooCommerce has transformed thousands of WordPress websites into eCommerce shops. Now that WooCommerce dominates 23% of the market, business owners are wondering how to streamline the incoming sales data.
That’s where native integrations, like QuickBooks Sync for WooCommerce, come into play.
As a highly customizable and comprehensive integration to sync customer, product, order, and inventory data in one convenient place, here’s what to know about WooCommerce’s QuickBooks add-on. We’ll also dive into some alternative solutions.
What’s WooCommerce’s QuickBooks add-on?
WooCommerce’s QuickBooks add-on is QuickBooks Sync for WooCommerce, an integration created by MyWorks Software. MyWorks Software has been developing automation plug-ins and integrations for WordPress and QuickBooks since 2011, when WooCommerce was first launched.
QuickBooks Sync for WooCommerce is touted as the ‘most customizable and robust’ integration that can be used across QuickBooks Online subscriptions as well as desktop accounts and point-of-sale (POS) devices. It’s also incredibly user-friendly, which is ideal for new eCommerce business owners.
Because QuickBooks Sync is a native extension, sellers save hours on manual entry and account mapping. The integration automatically imports all information from a WooCommerce store — including customer details, order information, and inventory levels — directly to QuickBooks.
If you’re selling through WooCommerce, connecting with QuickBooks Sync is essential to:
- Monitor inventory. Rather than import from Excel, sync QuickBooks with WooCommerce to monitor inventory levels, manage the cost of goods sold (COGS), and receive notifications when stock is low to create purchase orders directly from QuickBooks.
- Automate accounting. WooCommerce orders and payments are automatically sent to QuickBooks and instantly entered in your desired format to improve financial forecasting, enhance visibility into business analytics, and simplify bookkeeping.
- Maintain tax compliance. QuickBooks has several sales tax features for eCommerce businesses to help maintain compliance and avoid steep penalties, including the ability to automatically calculate sales tax and properly record it under expenses.
How to integrate QuickBooks and WooCommerce
There are several reliable ways for eCommerce business owners to connect a QuickBooks account to a WooCommerce store, the primary being the native integration, QuickBooks Sync. QuickBooks’ parent company, Intuit, as well as automation provider, Zapier, also have WooCommerce solutions.
WooCommerce’s Native Integration
As mentioned above, QuickBooks Sync for WooCommerce by MyWorks Software is the native integration to connect a QuickBooks account with a WooCommerce store. According to WooCommerce, QuickBooks Sync is the only official WooCommerce extension for QuickBooks.
All you have to do is begin the free download to get started. From here, the extension will live inside your WooCommerce and WordPress dashboard, so you can control the sync of sales and inventory data directly from your website backend. Store information can be synced up to every five minutes.
Pros for the WooCommerce native integration:
- Provides near real-time two-way product sync so eCommerce website data reflects current pricing and inventory levels
- Deep integration into WooCommerce itself provides sync status indicators inside orders and adds sync updates to order notes
- Set-up is simple and includes unlimited support available 24/7 as well as guided calls, videos, resource guides, and support forums
However, this native integration does have some limitations:
- Though features like real-time sync are free, a subscription is required for certain advanced features, like displaying QuickBooks invoices in WooCommerce customer accounts
- Flexible mapping allows you to map names and SKUs that don’t match, which can create confusion over the long term
- Sync frequency can take as long as one hour for free QuickBooks Sync plans
WooCommerce Connector by Intuit
WooCommerce Connector is a direct integration for a QuickBooks Online account and a WooCommerce store developed by Intuit. Intuit is the parent company of QuickBooks and several other software solutions, which means that data seamlessly flows from one app to the other.
According to Intuit, the WooCommerce Connector can save eCommerce business owners over 160 hours of manual data entry per month. And because the Connector was specifically built by Intuit, QuickBooks users can locate it directly under the Apps tab on their QuickBooks Online account.
And here are some pros of using this Intuit connector:
- WooCommerce Connector is completely free of charge for all features
- Connecting both platforms begins from your QuickBooks Online account to simplify set-up and auto-fill relevant fields
- Because the integration was created by Intuit, QuickBooks support can help troubleshoot issues and guide users through set-up
And here are some limitations of using this Intuit connector.
- As an Intuit product, the integration will not live within a WooCommerce or WordPress dashboard like a native WooCommerce solution
- Only compatible with WooCommerce version 3.5 or above and WordPress version 4.4 or above
- Default or plain permalinks will not support custom endpoints
Zapier
Last, but not least, is the Zapier WooCommerce + QuickBooks Online integration for eCommerce. Zapier is a popular automation tool that enables users to connect multiple applications with a series of Zaps, the term the company has coined for custom workflows that automate repetitive tasks.
With the third-party Zapier integration, you can choose triggers (certain customer actions) that will spark an action (an event performed by Zapier). So, not only does the integration help funnel sales and customer data into QuickBooks, but it can also automate other customer management tasks.
Here are some pros of this DIY approach:
- Provides a 14-day free trial for premium features and apps plus a set of “free forever” features
- Automatically generates coupons for new or returning customers based on incoming purchase orders
- Enables instant QuickBooks updates when any product or variation is created, updated, or deleted in your eCommerce store
And here are some limitations of using Zapier:
- Multiple Zaps will require a minimum $19.99 per month subscription to access
- Will not appear in the back-end of a WordPress dashboard or WooCommerce store for ease of access
- Not supported by Intuit or WooCommerce directly, so bug fixes and trouble-shooting may not be handled by either support team
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So, what do we recommend?
If you are a fast-growing eCommerce store, we recommend going with the native integration for simplicity and scalability. You can set it up once an you don’t have to worry about it breaking like some other integrations or hacky workarounds.
Looking for help with your QuickBooks setup? Schedule a free call with our team.
